SENTENCE - The Fictions of Ralph Robert Moore

the official website for the writings of
ralph robert moore

www.ralphrobertmoore.com

My new short story collection, Remove the Eyes, is now available as a trade paperbook and e-book download. Please go here for details.

Critical acclaim for Remove the Eyes

"Tired of the usual suspects? Bored with the same old genre clichés? Then follow my advice and read Ralph Robert Moore, a hell of a writer whose work is provocative and refreshing, never ordinary, always imaginative and graced by a compelling narrative style…Moore has all the features of a great writer: he conceives original plots, creates credible characters and makes them speak plausible dialogues, and, most of all, is a terrific storyteller. Try him, you won't regret it."

Mario Guslandi
from a review on Hell Notes.

"…[Moore's] work is not quite like that of anybody else. He is a true original, someone who has taken on board the lessons of genre and mainstream, then harnessed both to his own ends, and if you are looking for something different, then I can't recommend this collection highly enough."

Peter Tennant
from a review in issue 14 of Black Static.

"Unusual, erotic, frightening and stunningly good…This collection showcases the wide and versatile range of [Moore's] work. From the horrors of the internal demons that infest the wonderful "The Machine of a Religious Man" to the powerful and erotic, yet despairing "Rocketship Apartment", these stories capture the extremes of human experience. The writing is tight and uncompromising. The dialogue provides depth to the narrative, drawing the reader into shocking and unusual scenarios that stun, remaining in the memory long afterwards."

Trevor Denyer
from a review in issue 13 of Midnight Street.

Please go here for more details and ordering information.

Critics' Comments on Specific Novels or Stories

"It is easy to see why Father Figure has become an underground classic over the years. It is a dark, extremely disturbing but completely gripping suspense thriller with a strongly erotic subtext...Moore is an extremely talented writer with a gift for pushing the reader's emotional buttons...certainly liable to become a cult classic, and deservedly so."

From an editorial review of the novel Father Figure, published by Bookbooters

"For me, the masterpiece of the collection is The Rape by Ralph Robert Moore, a multi-viewpoint – in every sense of the word – examination of an apparent rape (or is it) that sizzles with tension and inventiveness."

Terry Grimwood, in Whispers of Wickedness, reviewing The Rape, published in Sein und Werden.

"…once again the editors have confirmed their extraordinary literary taste and excellent editorial instinct by selecting twenty stories which, for the most part, are up to the high expectations of 'Darkness Rising' aficionados…In some instances, I suspect, the stories are so good as to surpass even the best from the previous volumes, much to the delight of everyone fond of solid, compelling short fiction...[four of the stories] are really outstanding..."The Woman in the Walls" by Ralph Robert Moore is quite amazing. Despite the tell-tale title (believe it or not, that's the core of the plot!) the story is so original and full of surprising twists it remains absolutely memorable."

Mario Guslandi, in The Agony Column, reviewing The Woman in the Walls, published in the hardcover anthology, Darkness Rising 2005.

"This is a very strong tale, which will take a hold of you at the beginning and grip until the end. It tells of a farmer and his family and the tragedies which fall upon them, and of the dedicated employee who does anything the farmer asks of him. I found this tale to be very emotional, yet creepy and violent. Moore puts us, the reader, right into the story as if we are driving it, and we are."

Chris Cartwright, in Whispers of Wickedness, reviewing The Machine of a Religious Man, published in Midnight Street, Spring 2005

"…as it's always the case in any anthology, some stories in "Read By Dawn" are positively awful, some just ordinary, and only a bunch are worth mentioning. The latter group, in my opinion, amounts to a dozen, which is not bad at all in a volume assembling twenty-seven tales …The Little Girl Who Lives in the Woods by Ralph Robert Moore is a very dark, cruel tale about the hidden truths of human existence, blending the reality of spoiled innocence, loneliness, violence and hunger for love."

Mario Guslandi, in Horror World Review, reviewing The Little Girl Who Lives in the Woods, published in the anthology, Read Before Dawn, 2006.

"Another mind-blowing story is Truth Be Told by Ralph Robert Moore, and it is probably the story that most fits the ‘artifice’ remit. A couple – Franklin and Sarah – are talking. He questions her about her encounter at work with another woman, and his questions gradually lead her on to more and more pornographic descriptions of the encounter. It is obvious from her changing stories that much of what she is saying cannot be true. Is she taking her cues from Franklin’s (leading) questions? Is this some sort of a game that they play regularly? But there is a narrative outside of Sarah’s, and it is moving on and taking the reader somewhere disturbing. A quite remarkable story."

Jim Steel, in Whispers of Wickedness, reviewing Truth Be Told, published in Sein und Werden, Volume 1, Issue 4, 2007

My novel Father Figure, a bestseller for its publisher in trade paperback, is now available for free in PDF format. Click here to go to a page where you can download the complete text of the novel.

If you're here, it's probably night. You can see a window from where you sit, and the window is dark. Who really knows what's outside?

I write. If you read, we've just made a connection.

SENTENCE is the forest you fall asleep into.

Like most authors, I'm more comfortable between covers, but the truth is that's getting harder and harder to achieve these days. Markets have become increasingly timid in this family values age. Plus the table of contents of most periodicals nowadays is decidedly tipped in favor of the falsehoods of nonfiction over the disturbing truths of fiction. Length is another alarm. Many small-circulation magazines, understandably, want to represent as many writers as possible in an issue, and therefore are less likely to accommodate the girth of a well-fed novella.

Back in the thirties, when fiction magazines were as popular as television is today, young writers could move to the cement and grass of the city and be on newsstands two months later.

We bemoan the loss of those days of opportunity, but the truth is we now have more magazines than ever before, only they're called websites. Thanks to cyberspace, anyone can put out their own magazine. No more backroom arguments with printers, no more getting down on your knees in front of advertisers, no more embarrassment trying to extract your right index fingertip from the white string knotted atop the bundle of the latest issue.

Some people say, but if you put your fiction on the web, it'll be stolen. Let's examine that. What could be stolen is either the story itself, or its ideas. A story can be stolen printed or posted, but it should be fairly easy to establish, in either case, the author. If you want, include in your text an anagram that, when held up to light, identifies you like a watermark as the author. Ideas can be stolen-- a simile, a description, a joke-- but that will happen regardless of the medium in which your baggage is left alone on the airport floor. The truth is, fear of plagiarism is fear of readership.

We have an enormous range of talent out beyond the electricity. Talent that can share on the Internet. There are dangers, but to be plagiarized is never fatal. What is more important is to be read. Because if it's in a box, and no one but you knows about the storms raging through the paragraphs, the footsteps plodding soggily down the sentences, water dripping off the rims of words, that's the biggest shame of all. A fizzle. Because the real achievement of writing is not the writing. The real achievement of writing is someone else reading the writing.

I've been published in America, England, Ireland, and Australia, and translated into Lithuanian. My fiction has been called "graphically morbid". My writings are not for everyone. Are they for you? Find out.

You can either go to one of the links in the upper left of this page to read the complete texts of many of my short stories and other writings, published and unpublished, as well as lengthy excerpts from my novels, or you can go to Words Walking Nude, a collection of about fifty short excerpts from my work, to see if you like my style, and what I have to say.

Art is an invitation to go inside someone else's mind. To see our world as they see it. SENTENCE is my mind.

I'm glad you came. I just lit a cigarette. I just poured Merlot. I hope you enjoy your exploration.

For a complete chronology of site updates, please see HISTORY.

Established January 1, 1998.

SENTENCE Publishing

"All was chaos, that is, earth, air, water, and fire were mixed together; and out of that bulk a mass formed-- just as cheese is made out of milk-- and worms appeared in it, and these were the angels."

-- Domenico Scandella, 1599 (Two years before being burned at the stake).

note

september 1, 2010

Mary's dad, Joe, died suddenly August 18.

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